It was smiles all round for Great Britain’s women’s team pursuit squad as they successfully beat Germany to defend their world title at the 2024 UCI Tissot Track World Championships in Denmark.
Women’s team pursuit
The women’s team pursuit topped off the evening’s racing with an impressive win in the team pursuit, catching the German team to seal back-to-back world titles.
Having qualified fastest, the women’s team pursuit squad of Katie Archibald, Jess Roberts, Josie Knight and Anna Morris entered the track on fine form for their match up with China. They wasted no time in delivering an impressively dominant first round performance that saw them catch the Chinese team at just over the halfway mark to put them through to the gold medal final against Germany.
In the final, Meg Barker joined the line up in place of Jess Roberts. Great Britain delivered a fast start, picking up the pace lap by lap until they had a 2.115 second lead on Germany at the first kilometre.
Staying composed and tight to formation, by the halfway split the quartet were closing down on their opponents with a 4.027 lead. Their lead on Germany only extended in the second half, with the gap closing pedal stroke by pedal stroke, before Barker bailed to leave the final three riders to race to the line.
With six laps to go, the team were on track to make the catch, and completed their goal with 625m to go, delivering an impressive defence of their world title to take the gold.
Asked whether being defending champions added pressure, Josie Knight said: “I don’t think it does. People kept saying we were the defending, but no one can take away that title from last year, so this was another opportunity to win again. We had nothing to earn, it was just another opportunity.”
Meg Barker added: “When you win it, it feels easy! Those that go the fastest generally feel the best. I think we did exactly what we wanted to do, but we maybe didn’t expect the catch so early!”
Women’s elimination
Sophie Lewis had a disappointing elimination race, after starting well and finding good positions in a stacked field. An unfortunate mistake cost Lewis and she was eliminated from the race early on, finishing 15th overall.
Qualifying
Qualification got off to an incredibly strong start for the women’s sprinters, with the leaderboard showing a British 1-2-3 after the flying 200m. Reigning world champion Emma Finucane qualified fastest in a time of 10.377, with Sophie Capewell 0.005 seconds behind in second place and Katy Marchant 0.054 seconds behind in third place.
Having qualified straight into the 1/8 finals, Finucane, Capewell and Marchant showed their power and skill to comfortably beat their opponents before moving into the to the quarter finals.
The quarter finals saw Finucane against Liying Yuan (China) comfortably winning two of her three heats, as did Capewell who beat Martha Bayona Pineda (Colombia) with ease to see them both head into the semi-finals.
Meanwhile, Katy Marchant lined up against Hetty van de Wouw (Netherlands. Their first race came down to the wire and Marchant managed to just pip van de Wouw to the line. The second race saw roles reversed with van de Wouw taking the win by a small margin, making it one a piece. The final of an incredibly close round saw Marchant hit the sprint with one lap to go, with van de Wouw on her tail every step of the way pushing her full gas to the finish. A neck and neck photo finish gave the win to van de Wouw, sadly ending Marchant’s competition.
Today will see the women’s omnium and individual sprint rainbow jerseys up for grabs.
You can watch the event live on BBC and Discovery+ as well as follow updates on the British Cycling social media channels.
